Photograph
by CaitlinNeko
Summary: Edward couldn't believe what he was seeing. It's couldn't be…it just couldn't.


**Disclaimer:** I have ownership of neither Fullmetal Alchemist nor its characters.

_Note:_ There is an image that goes with this (I'll provide the broken up link at the bottom). Spoilers for the Fullmetal Alchemist movie. Ed/Hei with implied one sided Alfons/Noah

**Photograph**

Edward couldn't believe what he was seeing. It's couldn't be…it just couldn't.

He shook his head furiously, squeezing his eyes shut, tight, against the tears that he felt stinging his eyes, threatening to escape, "No…" he mumbled.

"Brother…" the hushed whisper came from behind him, and he felt a hand brush against his shoulder. Edward began to shake, which scared the younger of the brothers, causing him to pull away, afraid that the touch was what had caused the reaction.

"I'm sorry…" came the hushed whisper from Ed, but it wasn't for Alphonse. It was for _Alfons_. Biting his lip to try and avoid the tears and sobs that wanted, so desperately, to escape, he moved slowly toward the place where Noah stood, but he paid no mind to her.

He was _dead_ – he couldn't believe it but it was true – the other boy was dead – _dead_ and _gone_. He felt some kind of strange pressure building up in his chest that he couldn't explain and he felt his eyes burning, like there was some find of horrible things stinging at them, and he felt like just crying it all away but he _couldn't_. He didn't want to, not now, and he wouldn't…_couldn't_.

He moved a bit closer before dropping down onto his knees, quite near the other boy, just staring at him, and looking at the blank, dull blue eyes that stared ahead now, staring upwards, and staring _at nothing_ all the same as the boy lay there on his back, facing the open ceiling of the building they were in – the very direction Edward had gone in, because of this man, mere moments before.

But…

…he was smiling.

Alfons was dead and he was _smiling_ as he lay there, motionless and cold, face pale, and in a pool of his own blood – eyes staring up, almost like they were filled with a familiar hope, and he was smiling, and suddenly Edward couldn't stand the hope that seemed to consume the other's features.

He was a bastard.

A selfish asshole that didn't deserve any of this.

Alfons had died for him – died to get him back hope, and was happy doing this for him and it honestly hurt, now, when he thought about it – because even after the other had died to get him home he had come back, anyway.

It was all for nothing.

Edward couldn't take it any longer and he clenched his eyes shut tight, and balled his hands into fists at his sides before punching the ground, refusing to look at the German boy any longer.

He felt hands on his shoulder, and he heard whispered apologies (_"I'm sorry, Edward, for what happened…I know he was a close friend to you…"_) and the whispered promises and comfort (_"I'll arrange for someone to come retrieve the body – I promise that he'll at least get a proper funeral."_), but he couldn't tell from who the words or touches came, anymore, and he found that he frankly didn't _care_ anymore.

After a time everything was silent and he looked up and around to find that he was almost completely alone. He saw, to one side, that Alphonse was talking with – perhaps trying to comfort – poor Noah, who looked like a pathetic little doe caught in the headlights, like she was lost, scared and alone.

And so he might as well have been alone – if you didn't count that Alfons was still there, though the eyes were now closed shut to the world.

Edward took a deep breath, trying to keep his composure through all of this, and he moved a bit closer, reaching one hand out to brush back some of Alfons' bangs, and letting his fingertips linger there for a moment, on the younger male's cheek.

Edward bit his lip as he stared down at the other, listening to the faint sounds of someone coming (probably to get Alfons…to take him away…), before…he noticed something – he noticed something underneath the other boy, by the looks of it something that had fallen out of the other's pocket when he had fallen to the floor after…after he had been shot.

Edward hesitantly reached out to pull the thing out from underneath the other boy, and gasped once he recognized what exactly it was.

A photograph.

A photograph of the two of them, together – presumably a snapshot that, if he recalled, Noah had taken while the three of them were out for a walk, enjoying the clear blue skies the day had had to offer. He saw, now, the look of almost _longing_ in the other's eyes – longing for the stars and the sky, and longing for…something else. Something more.

And he noticed the blood that stained the photo now – Alfons' own blood sprinkled over the picture and his own greyed face.

He took the photo in both hands and sealed his eyes shut for a moment before he rose to his feet, hearing other people approaching, talking in sombre voices while Edward couldn't even find any words at all. He shook as he slipped the image into his jacket pocket, and turned away, moving swiftly past the people who approached, without a word to them or two Alphonse or Noah as he left, Alphonse immediately following along behind him, knowing not to disturb his brother's silence. After a long moment, though, Edward let out a low, hushed, pain filled whisper.

"I understand, Alfons…"

Edward spoke to no one any more than completely necessary for the next few days, not even a word on the day of Alfons' funeral – refusing to speak for the boy, when asked, and refusing to say anything to anyone, remaining as quiet and hard as a stone throughout, and waiting where he stood until the last of everyone disappeared from sight.

"I'll…be at home, brother…don't stay out too late, please…"

Edward said nothing to even that, and continued to stare fixedly at the ground before the gravestone, before he finally bent down before it, slipping the blood stained, old photograph out of his pocket and letting it rest gently overtop the photo of Alfons that rested on the grave, allowing both pictures to lay together, and only then did Edward let the tears begin to flow as he rose to his feet, and turned to walk away, as far and fast away as he could manage, not wanting to turn back and see the proof ever again, even as another hushed whisper left his lips…

"…I love you too, Alfons."

pics. livejournal. com/ caitlinneko/ pic/ 00001a4r


End file.
